Facebook Shops Increase Fan Page Engagement

Our past case studies and client interviews have revolved around a Facebook store generating traffic to an existing e-commerce website or using PayPal’s simple checkout. But what about using a Facebook store to improve engagement on your Facebook fan page? Physique 57, a barre-based fitness company with studios in New York City, Beverly Hills and the Hamptons, has been doing just that with their Facebook shop and fitness services. They take advantage of all their social functions such as, “sharing,” “tweeting,” and “pinning” that the ShopTab store provides to make their client base aware of new products and classes.

Physique 57 understands that social media means you need to be social, not a sales pitch. When you create interesting conversations online you are more likely to relate to your cliental, which will increase the likelihood of future sales or referral from fans to their friends.

We spent some time with Natasha Attal, Social Media Manager, with Physique 57 and wanted to share their insights.

Tell us a little bit about your company?

Physique 57 has been a New York City fitness favorite since in 2006 when we sparked a bar studio craze creating a cult following, sold out classes and a celebrity clientele. Praised by press and regulars alike for our rapid results, the signature Physique 57 full body barre-based workout blends intervals of cardio, strength training, stretching and recovery to sculpt your arms, thighs, seat and abs and build gorgeous, long lean muscle. As fun as it is rigorous, our innovative choreography, energizing music, personalized coaching and motivating class community, actually make you look forward to working out. It’s addictive!

In addition to our signature classes and studios in New York City, Bridgehampton and Beverly Hills, we offer 6 Physique 57 Workout DVDs and The Physique 57 Solution, a fitness and nutrition book. Our engaging online community inspires clients with tips, advice and encouragement to help motivate them wherever they are.

When did you start engaging with clients in social networks like Facebook and Twitter?

We launched our Facebook page in 2008 and our Twitter page in July 2009. We have over 17,000 Facebook fans, 8,400 Twitter followers and 1,100 Pinterest followers. We are also active on Foursquare and YouTube. Interacting with our online community is a great way for us to answer questions about our technique, motivate clients and help clients get to know one another.

How has your thinking changed in terms of using social marketing?

Social media marketing is not about telling followers about deals and why you’re a great company. We use it to help our clients make informative decisions and live their most healthy lives. For us, social media is a way to communicate with our clients beyond the point of purchase and also give them a way to communicate with each other and feel part of our wellness community no matter where they live.

Why did you decide to deploy a Facebook store with your social marketing?

It has been important for us to give our clients an easy route to sign up for classes and find our products online. ShopTab (and other wonderful platforms such as Healcode) have allowed us to provide clients with instant access to our product offerings right on Facebook. We particularly love the ability to tag a product as our featured product and the fact that people can share the products with their friends directly from the tab.

What have you learned about engaging your fans with you Facebook store?

There are 3 main Facebook tabs that you can have on your Facebook page. We make sure to include our ShopTab as one of those 3 tabs so that people see it upon visiting our page. Tab visibility and promotion is the key to its success.

How do you gauge success with social commerce and your overall social marketing?

We use Google analytics to track sales and visits from our social sites. It allows us to see when people make purchases and what we may have posted that led them to make those purchases.

Note: Physique 57 tracks their social performance for traffic and sales via Google Analytics. ShopTab provides tracking directly inside of Google Analytics with a simple feature that allows the client to create unique Google Analytic tracking from the Facebook Shop.